Unlimited Power 02 - The Ranger's Domain

              Instead of letting Femradiel train her new body, he decided to take her to check things all over the country. By using Teleport, they managed to check all the states in a single day. While Ryan didn't have many chances to level up some skills or obtain a new class, at least he managed to map the country and find the places where there were massive concentrations of monsters. Fortunately, there were no other dungeon masters like Seth and Isis, so things were relatively safe in his country.

              While Ryan was working on that, things were taking another weird turn in the secret base that was being controlled by Mark. Since they didn't have the need to look for new dungeons or new threats, they have been keeping a close eye on Ryan. Despite the darkness of the night, they saw him fighting alongside the Demi-felines against the Werewolves.

"What do you people think of this?" Mark asked after making the few members of his circle of trust watch the footage of the two days Ryan stayed in Utah.

Even though the movie's speed had been increased by eight times, they still had to watch a pretty boring movie that lasted six hours. Despite that, everyone in the room watched everything attentively.

"It looked like Ryan noticed something amiss that we didn't notice," Cole replied. "He took action to eliminate the threat as usual, but then…"

"He joined the side of one of the monsters…" Anna finished Cole's sentence.

"… It sure looks that way," Cole said, slightly annoyed.

"What do you think, Carter?" Mark asked. "Can you give us a more cold analysis about this?"

"If I have to guess, based on Ryan's implementation, he talked with the dungeon master of the second dungeon more than once," Carter said. "In a certain part of the footage, he prepared to attack, but then suddenly stopped for some reason. I would bet that was the first time the dungeon master contacted him to offer something."

"They offered him something, but then he refused at first?" Mark frowned. "Why?"

"Ryan is pretty reckless and has plenty of confidence in his skills, the fact that he survived alone until now only shows that," Carter nodded. "The first offer probably hadn't been enough for Ryan, but then after he massacred the guards around the dungeon, things changed. The dungeon master probably recognized his skills since the barrier was lifted the very moment Ryan crossed it."

                For a few moments, the whole room stayed silent while the people there absorbed that information. It was hard to believe that an alien sapient creature would recognize the power and even the existence of a human. Few people in the room had the chance to fight highly intelligent monsters, so they had a hard time grasping the true meaning of that.

"I apologize for saying this, but… is this conversation really that important?" Tristan asked.

"... What do you mean by that, Tristan?" Natalia asked while glaring at her little brother.

"What I mean is… Ryan's domain has several dungeons that only show how much dungeon masters are trying to kill him," Tristan said. "While I do believe this while the situation is a bit weird, I don't think we have enough Intel to conclude that Ryan joined the monster's side."

"No one said that yet," Mark said.

"Yeah, but pretty much everyone here is already thinking that," Tristan said. "We are only trying to find new clues to confirm that. Look, I once respected Ryan, but now I think his actions are unjustified. However, that doesn't mean I will look for a way to find fault in every single of his actions."

            Once again, the entire room fell silent. Tristan's words annoyed a few but made the vast majority realize that they indeed were doing that… trying to find more reasons to hate Ryan and treat him as an enemy. That was another downside of the fact that all the inhabitants of the secret base had become more battle-oriented as of late. They were making their choices based on how much power or other benefits they would obtain and not how their actions would improve the lives of others in the future.

"... Let's proceed to the next subject of this meeting," Mark said. "Is Daniel's team working as hard as usual? How is their physical condition on the battlefield?"

"They are trying pretty hard to obtain new classes and level up the ones they already have," Katelyn replied. "All those who trained to warn them that they should slow down a little bit have been completely ignored by them."

"When was the last time they returned to the base?" Mark asked.

"Ten days ago," Katelyn replied.

            Many people sighed when they heard that. Staying outside wasn't only dangerous. It was also very uncomfortable. Despite that, Daniel, Holland, Lilian, Luke, Hugo, and Angela have been doing that pretty much whenever possible. They have been the ones who felt more ashamed and angrier when Ryan caused the dungeon breaks. They couldn't stop him when he put the lives of their friends on the line, and now, they are dead set in obtaining the power to prevent anything like that from happening again.

                    When Daniel obtained a domain stone, the first thing he did was use it and then give full rights to control his domain to his father. Thanks to Mark's help, pretty much everyone in the base donated thousands of coins to increase the size and the other aspects of the domain. Still, despite that, Daniel and the others had their own goals.

                    In the end, Mark ended the meeting feeling that he had wasted a lot of time. Keeping an eye on what Ryan was doing was necessary, but too hard since he could teleport. Besides, it wasn't like anything will change if he or others think that he is up to no good. There was a possibility that someday they would have to fight him. Still, Mark was fully aware that only a few dozen would be able to endure his attacks.